The present invention relates to a magneto-optical recording medium for use in a magneto-optical (thermal) recording process which records information with irradiation of, for example, a laser beam and reads out the recorded information by utilizing the magneto-optical Kerr effect of Faraday effect in the recorded portion of the medium.
Magneto-optical recording is considered to be prospective in view of high recording density.
In a magneto-optical recording medium, it is noted that a magnetic film serving as a magneto-optical recording film is composed of an amorphous magnetic alloy layer of rare-earth and transition metals, such as a Tb--Fe amorphous alloy layer, a Gd-Fe amorphous alloy layer or the like which can be easily formed by the technique of vacuum evaporation or sputtering and has an advantage of a high recording density without noise due to the crystal grain boundary.
Although such amorphous alloys have various advantages, there also exist some problems with regard to the anticorrosion property, since selective oxidation of the rare-earth elements, pitting corrosion and so forth are prone to occur.
Of the contrivances accomplished in an attempt to enhance the anticorrosion property of such magneto-optical recording medium, there is known an example disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 4693943, wherein Cr is added to the recording layer itself. In the above recording medium, however, a disadvantage is apt to occur in respect to deterioration of the magneto-optical characteristic because of the fact that the composition of the magnetic layer itself serving as a recording layer is rendered different from the composition presenting the optimal magneto-optical characteristic.